Fearful Symmetry
by Deb3
Summary: CSI:Miami. HC. Horatio relives the first case he ever investigated, the murder of his mother. Meanwhile, the CSIs find a case where DNA evidence cannot be correct.
1. Default Chapter

Disclaimer: Not my characters, and I'm just having fun with them.  
  
Rating: PG-13 (violence but nothing steamy)  
  
Pairing: H/C of course.  
  
Spoilers: Anything so far.  
  
****  
  
Tiger, tiger, burning bright In the forests of the night, What immortal hand or eye Could frame thy fearful symmetry?  
  
William Blake  
  
****  
  
Rosalind Caine looked up from her seat at the table and smiled at her oldest son as he slipped into his place. "Coffee? Breakfast isn't ready yet.  
  
"I'll get it," said Horatio. His teenage frame was gangly, not yet filled out, but he moved with a smooth grace that always reminded her of watching a well-correographed swim team. He returned to the table with his cup, and the two of them sat in companionable silence for a moment. Horatio always got up 30 minutes early for these times alone with his mother. And she always did likewise to have 30 minutes to spare. Rosalind was only medium sized - Horatio already towered over her at 17 - and solidly built, with direct hazel eyes and medium brown hair. The hair was her most striking feature, a perfect milk chocolate color, smooth, shining, beautiful. Her oldest son was as unlike her in appearance as he was like her in character. Tall, thin, with thick red hair, Horatio at 17 looked like a work in progress, a puzzle only partly completed. But as the two of them shared the coffee and the silence, there was a similarity between them. Something in the set of the jaw, the forthrightness of the eyes. Two crusaders who would be passionate for the right cause. Two people who had had responsibility thrust on them too young. For Rosalind, it had been her mother's death in a car accident, leaving her to raise her younger siblings. Then the death of her husband came years ago, when Horatio was 7 and Raymond was 3. Rosalind tried to protect her sons, especially Horatio, from the crushing responsibility that had settled over her own childhood. For years, she had thought she was succeeding, but Horatio's eyes, meeting hers across the table, were old beyond his years.  
  
"Is Ray up yet?"  
  
"No." Horatio looked away for a moment, a dead giveaway to someone as direct and perceptive as his mother. He heard the unspoken question and looked back. "He was hanging out with those boys again yesterday."  
  
Rosalind sighed. "I'll talk to him again. He's got a wild streak, Ray has, but as long as he lives under this roof, he will live by my rules." She smiled wistfully. "You know, Horatio, once I thought life was like a story. My father named me out of Shakespeare, and I named both of you after writers: Horatio Alger and Raymond Chandler. It took me a long time to learn that life isn't a story. It's too real. But I want you to know that I wouldn't change either of you or anything in my life for one moment of a fairy tale."  
  
Raymond Caine stumbled into the room, still half asleep, and stopped short as his mother and brother connected eyes across the table. "Talking about me behind my back again?"  
  
"Ray," his mother started, and Horatio interrupted her, very unusual for him. "Ray, if we were talking about you, it's because we're concerned. You're getting in with the wrong kind of friends."  
  
"How would you know, Mr. Perfect. You haven't been close enough to the wrong crowd to know it."  
  
"Both of you, sit down and eat your breakfast. And Ray, if I hear of you hanging around that gang again, you're grounded for a week. Next time, it doubles, two weeks, then four weeks, so on. At 12, you don't make the rules."  
  
The remainder of breakfast was eaten in silence, but as the boys went out the door to school, Rosalind reached up to put one hand on Horatio's shoulder. "I did mean what I said. I wouldn't change anything for you." He smiled at her, then headed out the door, steeling himself for the increasingly hard task of looking out for his little brother. His father wasn't around to do it, and his mother couldn't do everything. It was up to him.  
  
****  
  
"Mom, I'm home." Horatio stepped into the house and stopped cold. Silence, emptiness, the feel of a house without its heart. Something was wrong. Badly wrong. He did not call her again but started searching. He found her in the kitchen. The table was turned over, the trash can on its side, the entire room in a shambles. And his mother. Rosalind's face had been beaten so severely it was hardly recognizable. Her hands were clenched, nails extended, showing that she had gone down fighting to the last. And swirling around her bloody face was her beautiful chocolate hair. Horatio stood in the doorway in paralyzing shock. He did not go to her; the emptiness of the room already proclaimed that her spirit wasn't there anymore. In the stiffling silence, his own heartbeat echoed in his ears like the slamming of a door shutting off forever the last vestiges of his childhood. Then the silence shattered. "NO!!!!!!!!"  
  
****  
  
Horatio Caine sat bolt upright in bed, nearly falling out of it. The sheets were drenched in sweat, and his heartbeat drummed loudly in his ears, calling back the kitchen tableau with every thump. He sucked in deep breaths, trying to calm himself. Just a dream, he said, but he knew otherwise. It wasn't a dream, and it wasn't a tale of fiction, like his mother had once wanted. It was only too real. April 3. 28 years ago today, his mother had been killed. The dream came back yearly, at least on that occasion if not others, but it never lost its impact on Horatio. He stood up, slightly shaky on his feet, and went to the kitchen for a glass of water. Gulping it down, he looked at the clock. 3:30. Still, he knew that he would never get back to sleep this night. Rather than sitting around with ghosts in the dark, he started to get dressed.  
  
****  
  
"Hey, you're early today." Calleigh Dusquesne sailed into the lab with her long blonde hair flowing out behind in the speed of her passage. Calleigh rarely did anything at any less than full speed ahead. Except for one thing, that is. For two years, she had fought an increasingly difficult battle with her feelings for her boss. Sometimes she tried to avoid him, but that was even worse. Lack of him was almost a physical hurt, and she would find herself lost in thought, wondering what he was doing. So she relied on a front of easy banter. Contact, but not too personal or revealing. More and more, though, it wasn't enough.  
  
"Yeah, I came in to run some tests." Now that Calleigh got closer, she could see that Horatio looked either like something was really bothering him or like he had not slept at all. He was positively haggard. The teasing front fell away from Calleigh instantly, replaced by sharp concern. "Horatio, are you alright?"  
  
He straightened slightly from the equipment and rubbed his weary eyes. "Fine." It was so obvious a lie that she didn't even challenge it, letting it fall flat of its own accord. "I woke up and couldn't get back to sleep, so I came in to finish off some of this backlog."  
  
"Why don't we have some coffee? We could go to the break room and sit there for a while at the table. It will be a half hour or so before everyone gets in." She saw him pull back instantly, almost reacting with horror to her idea. What the hell was going on here? The idea of shared coffee and conversation had never put him off before.  
  
Horatio's cell phone rang, breaking the moment. "Horatio." Even edged with tiredness and tension, his voice gave her chills. "All right, we'll be there ASAP." He put up the phone and almost visibly pulled himself together, becoming her supervisor right before her eyes. "A woman was murdered over on Parker Street. Let's go."  
  
****  
  
Horatio stepped out of the Hummer and reached back in for his field kit. Calleigh already had hers and was heading for the crime scene, neatly taped off with yellow police tape. Detective Hagan was waiting for them. "Early morning jogger found her in an alley. No sounds or signs of the killer still around. Probably long gone." The radio in his police car crackled, and he moved toward it, unblocking their view. Poor woman, Calleigh thought. She lay in a pitiful crumpled heap at the side of the alley, head turned away from them, long chocolate brown hair spilling over her shoulders. Calleigh opened her field kit and put on latex gloves, then turned back to look at Horatio when she realized that he wasn't doing the same. He stood there with an expression in his eyes so stunned, so lost, that she forgot the woman in the alley and went to him instead. "Horatio." She touched his arm gently with one gloved hand. She tried to avoid touching him usually, but she wasn't sure her voice alone would reach him. He drew in a shuddering breath and turned to look at her. "Horatio, what's wrong? Did you know her?"  
  
His eyes dropped, and he said softly, "Um, no. Never saw her in my life. I'm fine, just tired. Like I said, I didn't get much sleep last night." He started across to the victim, all of his usual grace lost, moving like his feet were wooden. He crossed around her and knelt on the other side, looking directly at her face. Something in him relaxed slightly, the knot eased, and he opened his own kit and snapped on the gloves. "No visible injuries. She must have been ambushed. It was quick, anyway."  
  
"Or she trusted whoever killed her." Calleigh's own brain began to function, or at least half of it did. The other half was still focused on Horatio. He was the picture of professionalism now, but to someone who had studied him as much as she had, he looked slightly tightened, as if some God-like puppetmaster had taken up all of his strings a few notches.  
  
"What a way to start a morning." Alexx Woods arrived at the scene, going straight to the body. "Poor woman, this wasn't how you expected to start the day, either." She knelt next to Horatio, glanced at him once, then took a second longer look. He stood up, breaking the closeness. Alexx accepted his silent no-tresspassing sign and started to examine the body. "Neck snapped, possibly. Look at the bruising around her throat. Where's Delko?"  
  
"He and Speed are on another case. I'll take the pictures." Horatio took the camera out of his kit, focused, and started snapping. He usually tried to personalize his victims rather than distance himself from them, but right now, he was glad of the perspective the lens gave him. Calleigh, meanwhile, was walking carefully arround the alley, looking for anything that might be significant.  
  
"Horatio!" He was at her side instantly. "Look at this handkerchief. Maybe the killed dropped it."  
  
"Good job, Calleigh." The warmth of his praise melted her. "Let's bag it, tag it, and get it back to the lab. Stay here and cover the scene a few more times, would you? I'll go with Alexx. Are you ready to move, Alexx?"  
  
"Not much I can do here," the beautiful woman said, stepping back from the victim to let the ME's staff zip the body into a bag. She spoke to the body warmly, as if it could still hear. "Let's get you back to the lab and see what you can tell us. Maybe you can help us catch those people."  
  
****  
  
It was long past quitting time before Calleigh straightened up from the lab equipment. Hours at the crime scene had paid off that day when she had found a gun behind a dumpster. Not that it was definitely connected to the murder, unfortunately. The woman had died of a snapped neck, as Alexx had surmised. Still, it could have been used to threaten, or as a backup plan for the killer. The number had been filed off, and she had spent much of the day trying to reconstruct it. Time for a break, she thought. She hated leaving a job unfinished, but she realized that she was getting too tired to be at her best. Time to step back for a while, then come at it anew. She started down the hall to the break room, then spotted the light on in Horatio's office at the end of the hall. CSI was nearly deserted at this hour, and she stalked down the hall with an urgency she would never have wanted her colleagues to see. If poor Horatio was still here, slaving away even when he was so tired, she would escort him home personally. She herself was exhausted from the day, and she wasn't the one who had looked like death warmed over that morning.  
  
Calleigh opened the office door and froze. Horatio was at his desk, his shoulders slumped, his head on his arms. She closed the door much more quietly than she had opened it, but he did not stir. Sound asleep, poor guy, she thought. She stood there for a moment just enjoying the opportunity to watch him when he wasn't aware of her. Thick red hair, a slim yet powerful frame. The most captivating part, the eyes, were hidden. Still, it was not Horatio's physical attributes she admired. The pure soul of the man shone out like a lighthouse. Loyalty, intelligence, absolute dedication. She never tired of watching him at work, piecing the puzzles together, bringing justice to the victims of the city. The rest of them all had their specialties, but Horatio's specialty was fitting it all together. He saw more, and in more ways, than the rest of them. She longed again for the opportunity to do more than just watch him work. She wanted to love him, most of all to hold him, be there for him like he was there for so many people. Horatio spent his life giving to everyone else; Calleigh dreamed of giving to him. But his wall of control would not allow it. Everyone who knew him admired him, but no one was allowed to get close.  
  
Calleigh walked around his desk, trying to move silently, but his sleep was so deep that he never stirred. There was a small picture on the other side of his desk in a silver frame, and it occurred to her that she had never seen it, only the back of it from the visitor's chair. Who would someone so self-sufficient have a picture of on his desk? She picked it up softly, resisting the urge to touch Horatio's shoulders which were so near her hand. The poor guy needed his rest. The picture was of a woman and two boys. She recognized Horatio instantly, a much younger Horatio, but the other two she had never seen. The second boy could only be Ray, a smaller, softer version of his brother, less strength of character in the face, less direct honesty in the eyes. It was the woman who took Calleigh's breath away, though. Her eyes were not blue, but the expression was pure Horatio. Her hair was the most beautiful shade of chocolate, exactly the shade of that morning's victim. In that instant, Calleigh had a glimpse of what had disturbed Horatio so much that morning. Fortunately for Horatio, the resemblance ended at the hair. Once he had seen the face, she remembered, he had shaken off the past and settled to work. Still, something had been bothering him before he ever saw the body.  
  
Horatio shifted slightly, and Calleigh stepped back, afraid she was disturbing him. She quickly realized that she wasn't the one disturbing him, though. His head jerked slightly to the side, and his breathing became uneven. She hesitated. Should she wake him up? He answered that question himself, moaning slightly. His head had turned, and she could see that there was sweat standing on his forehead. Horatio never broke a sweat in the 90 degree Miami heat, but he was sweating now. Calleigh stepped forward and slid one hand across his shoulder in a comforting way. "Horatio," she said softly. "Wake up. It's just a dream."  
  
"NO!!!!!" Calleigh had never heard his voice raised, but the one word was absolutely a scream, torn from deep within him. Horatio leaped bolt upright from his chair, crashed into the corner of the desk, and actually fell over. Calleigh stood stunned for a second; she had never seen him clumsy. Then she moved instantly, going to him as he picked himself up from the floor.  
  
"Horatio, are you alright? It was just a dream." His eyes were fully lucid now, but the pain behind them hurt her more than a gunshot would. He hesitated for a moment, then replied, realizing that a lie would never pass here. He knew he had screamed; she saw it in his eyes. And whatever he had screamed at, he could almost still see it.  
  
"No." The voice was his usual soft tone but with a broken edge that broke her heart. She had never heard him say he wasn't alright. Not to her. Not to anyone. "No, I'm not alright, Calleigh. And it wasn't just a dream." She realized suddenly that she was gripping him by both arms; in fact, she was half holding him up.  
  
"Do you want to talk about it?"  
  
He took a deep breath. "No. Not now. Let's talk about something else. Anything else."  
  
Once her heart would have leapt at the opportunity, but she was too consumed with worry for him to give way to her own feelings. Never in a thousand years would she take advantage of whatever nightmare he was living for her own selfish reasons. "Okay," she said, smiling at him. "Let's go get coffee, okay? And we'll talk about something else."  
  
He gave her a wan smile. "Thanks, Calleigh." They left the office together and turned out the light. 


	2. Fearful Symmetry 2

We are done with Hope and Honour, we are lost to Love and Truth, We are dropping down the ladder rung by rung; And the measure of our torment is the measure of our youth. God help us! For we knew the worst too young.  
  
Rudyard Kipling  
  
****  
  
Ray Caine was coming home after failing to find his new friends following school. In his young and at times rebellious life, he always still came home. It would have never occurred to him not to return. His mother was the anchor of his life. He might toss at the top of the waves, he might resist her tight restraint, but deep down, her hold on his life was comforting. Horatio would be there ahead of him, of course. Horatio was three steps ahead of Ray in everything. The most infuriating thing, though, was his brother's mental agility. With no experience of doing wrong, Horatio could still outthink Ray at every turn, could see where he was heading miles away, and could keep their mother posted like a private intelligence service. It was like a child playing chess with a master. And Horatio shouldn't be that far ahead of him. Four and a half years wasn't that much difference. Ray's dreams were of one day being better than Horatio at something, with his mother looking on.  
  
Ray turned the corner of their street and stopped in his tracks. Red and blue lights swirled against the white house, and an ambulance was pulling away. Police cars. Too many police cars. They didn't send four police cars just when someone was sick. And the ambulance passed him somberly, silently. There was no longer any reason to hurry. Ray stood paralyzed at the corner. Surely nothing bad could have happened here. Not to his family. Ray couldn't remember his father, couldn't remember a loss, but he knew in this instant that something awful had happened to one of the two people whose presence he had always taken for granted. They couldn't die. As annoying as they were sometimes, they couldn't die. He broke into a staggering run down the street, finding himself hoping that it was Horatio in the ambulance, not his mother. Hating himself for hoping it. Hoping it anyway.  
  
****  
  
Horatio sat on the back porch. The detective had brought him a glass of water, but it sat untouched at his side. Anyone not looking at his eyes would have thought him perfectly calm. The policeman with him was looking at his eyes, and he thought the boy looked like he had just stepped straight out of hell. But only the eyes showed anything. The rest of him seemed calm. Too calm. "Is there any other family we can call, Horatio?"  
  
"No, we don't have any family. Just the three of us." He might have been discussing the weather.  
  
"You shouldn't stay here. Any friends? Anyone?"  
  
"Why can't I stay alone? I'm 17. I can take care of us."  
  
"You don't need to be alone." The boy did not react. "And legally, you know, you can't stay alone. There's a big difference between 17 and 18. We have to take you somewhere. You and your brother." Nothing yet. "Besides, we need this house for a while. We have people who will study the evidence, use it to find out who did this. You can't stay here; you'll interfere with the investigation." And who would want to stay here with the memory of that kitchen?  
  
Horatio looked up, as if he heard the thought. The tortured eyes unfocused slightly, as if he was remembering the kitchen. Then they came together again with a sharp, analytical focus and a slight tilt to the head that startled the policeman. He had only seen that expression once before in his life, in the eyes of a veteran FBI agent whose capture record was legendary. "All of the evidence . . . it will show who killed her?"  
  
"Absolutely." Not always, but no point in telling him that. "We have one of the best crime labs in the state."  
  
Screams and sobs came from around the front of the house. "Let me in, I have to see her! I have to!" Horatio scrambled to his feet and started around the house. Two policemen reached the gate just as he did. Ray, kicking and fighting, was suspended between them, trying to break away. "Let me go!" Horatio gripped his brother's shoulders, hard. Caught in the triple grip, realizing the futility of struggling, the 12-year-old collapsed in a sobbing heap. Horatio knelt next to him, and the policeman who had been in the back yard jerked his head slightly at his colleagues. They pulled back a few feet, giving the boys privacy while still being close enough if physical restraint was needed. They spoke in low whispers.  
  
"No family?"  
  
"No family, no close friends. We have to do something with them."  
  
"I guess we'd better call Child Services. That older one is a cool customer, isn't he? Can you imagine not going into the room, not disturbing anything?"  
  
"Anyone could tell she was dead," said the first one. "But you're right, it's not natural somehow. Why isn't he freaking out? But you all know how many liars we've talked to over the years. I'd stake a month's salary that he's told us the total truth."  
  
Horatio didn't hear them, focused on his brother. "It's better to remember her like she was, Ray. You wouldn't have wanted to see her." For one panic-stricken moment, Horatio himself couldn't remember what she looked like, what she had looked like, that is. He only saw the bloody, beaten face and the hair. He gulped and shook himself slightly. Ray was crying, all fight gone out of him.  
  
"I don't believe it, Horatio. I just don't believe it. She was so alive."  
  
"I know." Horatio couldn't believe it either. Just this morning, she had smiled at him across the table. Now she was gone. But he couldn't turn loose himself; he had to be strong for Ray. His mother's biggest worry had been Ray, he knew. He will be alright, Mom, Horatio promised her spirit, hoping that it could hear him. He will be alright. I'll look after Ray for you. And he'll make us both proud. Horatio knelt there on the grass, both arms around his brother. Ray's shoulders were still shaking; his voice had broken down into incoherence. Horatio gripped his shoulders tightly, and promised his mother again that he would take care of his brother, and promised himself that he would find whoever had done this.  
  
But he did not cry.  
  
****  
  
Horatio was asleep again. Calleigh sat at the table in the break room in CSI, watching him. They had talked over coffee until she had exhausted her supply of trivial subjects. She was unused to leading in a conversation with him, and she was certainly unused to small talk. But she had stayed off the subject of work, too, realizing now that one of the things bothering him that day had been how much the victim on their present case reminded him of his mother. Gradually, as they talked, the tension had washed out of him. The exhaustion was still there, though; he looked even worse than he had that morning. She had finally persuaded him to stretch out on the couch in the break room. "I ought to get home," he said, but she understood why he didn't want to, why for once he did not want to be alone. "Why don't you just sleep a little while, and I'll wake you up in a bit. You're too tired to drive, really." His whole being shied away from the idea of going to sleep again, and she added, "I'll stay here with you. And if you start dreaming again, I'll wake you up before . . . before you get to the end of it."  
  
The gratitude in his eyes at her understanding melted her. "Just a little while," he said. "You need to get home yourself. You're tired, too."  
  
"I'll wake you up in an hour, and we'll both go home." He had stretched out on the couch then, finally, and he was asleep within two minutes. And Calleigh sat there watching him and wondering what the hell was going on. Her own fatigue had vanished in the light of a problem as intricate as any of the cases she had ever tackled on the job.  
  
Study the evidence, she told herself. The evidence doesn't lie. Okay, fact one, Horatio had obviously had an awful time sleeping the last two nights because of some nightmare. She still remembered that wild, convulsive leap as he had awakened, the scream so unlike him. Whatever he was dreaming of, she had seen the horror in his eyes immediately afterwards. Not just fright, not just terror, but horror, the silent cry of the soul that what it has seen cannot be. What would he react that strongly to? Correction, what had he reacted that strongly to? Calleigh had no doubt at all that whatever he was dreaming had actually happened. Horatio was the least likely person she knew to dream of vague, fanciful monsters and bogeymen. And even if he did once, it wouldn't be recurrent, and it wouldn't have such an effect on him. No, this wasn't just a dream, like he had said.  
  
She wondered if it involved his family. His reaction at the crime scene that day could certainly be explained just by the chance resemblance of chocolate hair, but could he have been thinking of his family anyway? Now that she thought about it, she realized how little she knew about Horatio's family. Ray Caine, his brother, had been a cop, possibly a dirty cop, and had been killed just after she got to CSI. She hadn't known Horatio long enough then to really gauge the effect of his brother's death on him when it happened, but since then, she knew, that was the one subject Horatio was never quite reasonable on. It rarely came up, and when it did, his mind simply refused to consider any alternative to his brother's honesty. So unusual for a man who habitually looked at everything from all angles. Was he dreaming about his brother's death, maybe? She didn't think he had been there at the shootout that took Ray's life, though, and whatever he was dreaming about, she was sure he had seen. Vividly and in person. She decided to try to find the police chart on that shootout and verify the facts.  
  
What about his mother? What about his father, for that matter? She had never heard him speak of either one of them. The picture on his desk was obviously a studio family shot, not amateur, so she could assume that his father had been out of the picture by that point. Dead or just split? How old was Horatio in that picture, 15, 16 maybe? Without a father, but with a mother still. Let's see, she figured mentally, he's 45 now. His mother would be about 70 now if alive. She certainly hadn't abandoned the family, Calleigh thought, remembering the strength of that face. So she must be dead. And must have died young. Alexx, Calleigh thought suddenly. Alexx has known him longer than any of us. I'll ask her if she knows about his parents.  
  
Horatio turned on the couch, shifting restlessly. Calleigh went over to him instantly and gently placed her hand on his arm, too softly to wake him up, she hoped, but enough to establish some contact wherever his mind was. "I'm here," she whispered. He quieted instantly under her touch. She stayed where she was, kneeling on the hard floor, maintaining the contact. Despite her promise, she had no intention of waking Horatio up after only an hour, and she had no intention of letting him spend this night alone. Whatever he was dealing with, his physical reserves were too low to handle it. He desperately needed a good night's sleep. And he was going to get it tonight if she had to spend the whole night here crouched on the floor at CSI.  
  
Calleigh looked at the break room clock. 11:45, although it felt much later. What a day, she thought. That morning seemed an eternity away. Why this day, she suddenly wondered? Whatever is bothering him, family or other, why is it so bad today? He had seemed a bit subdued yesterday in retrospect but certainly his usual self when he left CSI. And he never went anywhere other than home. This job was his life. So what was the trigger? What had happened between last night and this morning? Kneeling on the floor there, her hand on Horatio's arm, her back against the couch, she memorized every line of his face, enjoying the opportunity to be this close to him. And eventually, she fell asleep.  
  
****  
  
"Calleigh?" Calleigh opened her eyes. Bright early morning sunlight spilled into the break room. Slowly she focused on Speed.  
  
"Ugh." She sat up, wondering where Horatio was. She herself was now on the couch, not the floor, and he was nowhere to be seen. That at least said that he must have been some reasonable facsimile of his usual cat- footed self when he left. Still, she couldn't believe she hadn't woken up. He must have picked her up and put her on the couch. What a thing to sleep through!  
  
"You okay? Have you been here all night?" Speed offered her the cup of coffee he had poured for himself, and she gulped it in gratefully.  
  
"Yeah, I was working late, and I just thought I'd sleep for a minute." Actually, she had slept very soundly, amazingly so for being on the floor. Sleeping that close to Horatio was like a dream. "Have you seen Horatio this morning?"  
  
"No, I don't think he's in yet. Don't worry, he didn't catch you." Calleigh scrambled to her feet, not bothering to correct his assumption. "It's only 7:00," said Speed. "You probably have time to go home, shower, and change clothes if you want."  
  
"Good idea." The coffee was taking hold.  
  
"And if I do see H, I'll just tell him you aren't in yet."  
  
"Do that." Calleigh poured a second cup of coffee and headed out into the hall. She walked down to the far stairs, the ones next to Horatio's office. It was dark. He must have gone home to shower and change himself. You're not going to convince me everything's alright, Horatio, she promised him silently. Damn it, someone is going to share this with you. I'm going to share this with you. She left CSI and headed for her car. Today, she would talk to Alexx. 


	3. Fearful Symmetry 3

"Your mind is tossing on the ocean." William Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice  
  
****  
  
Horatio ducked under the crime scene tape, slipped his key into the lock, and opened the door. It was 5:00 AM, and the world seemed still asleep. He was later than he had planned, and he didn't want to run into the police, but he couldn't leave the temporary foster home where they had been placed until Ray was asleep; he had to be there for Ray now. Only when he was sure his brother was asleep had he allowed himself to focus on his second vow, to find out who had killed his mother. He had left a note on the kitchen table for Mrs. Spencer, the woman in whose house they had been placed, simply saying that he was out taking a walk and would be back later. Not a lie, he reassured himself. He had walked over here, and he would return later.  
  
Once inside, Horatio headed straight for the kitchen. He knew that his mother's body was no longer there, but he also knew that he would have to see it gone before he could settle to noticing other details. The bloodstains on the floor didn't help, but nothing could look as bad as his mother's face had. Every time he closed his eyes, he could still see it. He looked at the place where she had been until her absence had firmly registered, then he stood in the kitchen doorway and started to study the room, not looking for anything in particular, just seeing how it fit together, what the shambles and debris from the fight told him. For as long as he could remember, he had been able to see things, patterns that no one else could, how things fit together. He could work a jigsaw puzzle in no time flat. There was no trial and error to it. All he had to do was pick a piece, look at those remaining, and the matching piece would almost jump out of the rest. Once, for fun, he had worked a 500 piece puzzle in 15 minutes. His mother had marveled at it, Ray had fumed at it, and Horatio simply took it for granted, learning to downplay it around others so that he wouldn't frighten them. He had never tried to seriously apply it to any situation that mattered. Until now.  
  
He leaned against the doorway and studied the room, knowing not to focus too tightly. Like working the puzzle, it was a question of scanning and not getting distracted by one detail. At least he hoped it was like working the puzzle. For a moment, he could see nothing, but then the pattern started to settle. His mother had been over by the kitchen sink doing dishes; the sink still had cold soapy water sitting in it. Someone had come to the back door. She had gone to the back door but refused to open it. The murderer then kicked the door in - the lock was splintered - and the door had hit his mother, knocking her backwards against the wall. There was a slight indentation in the plaster where her head had hit, precisely in a line corresponding to the door's swing. She had come back fighting, and the ensuing scuffle had knocked over the trash can and table. She must have hurt her murderer, too; Horatio remembered her clenched hands and bloody nails. She had finally gone down for good next to the table, and her murderer had beaten her face to a pulp, going far beyond just causing death. Blood was spattered around a good bit of the room, but there was a pool there, where his mother had been lying.  
  
Horatio suddenly turned his back, gulping in deep breaths. This wasn't a mental agility exercise; she had actually been killed in there. What kind of person was he who could analyze his mother's death scene? A person who was going to damn well see justice done, he told himself. He apologized to his mother silently. I know this isn't one of our mind games, Mom, but I have to see it finished. I have to be doing something productive. Can you understand that? Still with his back to the kitchen, he walked across to the living room wall to study the pictures there. His favorite was of his mother playing the piano. Calm, serene, beautiful, expressive. He tried to memorize her features, but like yesterday, when he closed his eyes, he only saw her dead, beaten face. He opened them and looked at the picture some more.  
  
"Hold it, Miami-Dade Police!" A stern voice barked from the front door. Horatio turned slowly, hands up. "Hey, wait a minute. You're the kid who lived here, the one who called us." The young officer holstered his gun and entered. Horatio remembered him as one of the two who had kept Ray from rushing into the house. "Horatio, right? What are you doing here?"  
  
"I . . . I thought I might help." It sounded stupid when he said it, but the young officer replied kindly.  
  
"Look, Horatio, we do have people trained to do this. The best thing you can do is stay out of our way." Horatio didn't reply. Damn those eyes, thought the policeman. Aside from the eyes, he looked like a typical kid, but there was something there, an intelligence and a soul far above average. It was very hard to look straight at this kid and simply tell him he wasn't needed, even though he knew the kid shouldn't be here. "How did you think you could help us? You told us all you knew yesterday, didn't you?"  
  
"Yeah, but I thought I might see how it happened. The other officer said you could reconstruct the crime and find the killer from the evidence. So I thought if I looked at the kitchen, I might see something that would help you. I didn't touch anything. I was just looking."  
  
"And what did you see?" The policeman was getting curious in spite of himself.  
  
"Look." Horatio went back to the kitchen door. "She was doing dishes when someone came to the back door. She went over but didn't open it, and the door was kicked in. That means she knew who it was. She would have opened the door for a stranger, for anyone who might need help. If she didn't want to let him in, she knew him. She knew he was bad news."  
  
"How do you know she went over to the door? We saw that the door had been kicked in, but couldn't it have been kicked in suddenly while she was still at the kitchen sink? Then the fight started from there."  
  
"Behind the door, in the plaster, there's an indentation from her head. The door caught her and slammed her back. If she had been knocked there later, during the fight, she would have hit the door, not the wall behind it."  
  
The policeman was stunned. In three hours here yesterday, none of them had noticed the slight indentation in the plaster behind the door. He walked over to look more closely. Precisely at the victim's head height. "How long have you been here?"  
  
Horatio looked at his watch. "About 15 minutes before you." And in 15 minutes, he had spotted something that everyone yesterday in three hours had missed. Who was this kid?  
  
"Go on," said the detective, and there was nothing patronizing in his tone now. "What else did you see?" Horatio described the rest of the fight as he had pieced it together, and when he finished, the look of admiration and true respect in the detective's eyes warmed him, thawing the frozen core inside a bit.  
  
"So you see, it wasn't random," he said. "It wasn't a robbery gone wrong. She knew him, and she knew he was trouble. And he knew her. He went a long way past killing her. He wanted to send a message." Again, the stark reality of what he was saying suddenly gripped him, and he turned and bolted from the house.  
  
The detective caught up to him in the yard and gripped his shoulders tightly. "It's okay, Horatio. We'll get whoever did this." He checked his own watch. "Look, my supervisor will be here any minute, and he isn't going to like you being here. Why don't you leave first, and I'll contact you later today. We can talk more then."  
  
Horatio swung around to face him. "I have to help. I need to." The urgency in his voice melted the detective's heart.  
  
"You have helped, and I do mean it. I'll keep in contact. Only don't tell my superior, okay?"  
  
"What's your name, sir?"  
  
"Al Humphries. Rookie on the force this year." They shook hands solemnly, as if sealing a pact.  
  
"Mr. Humphries . . . "  
  
"Al," said the policeman firmly. "If I'm calling you Horatio, you have to call me Al."  
  
"Al. Could I take her picture? The one on the living room wall? That isn't part of the crime scene, and I'd like to remember what she looked like." He didn't elaborate, but Al heard the unspoken thought and remembered that Horatio had been the one to find her. Dear God, what a thing to come home to. Technically, he wasn't supposed to let anything leave that house, but the kid needed the picture. Just like he needed to help. And maybe he could help. The detective was still stunned at what this untrained kid had pieced together in 15 minutes.  
  
"Sure." They walked back into the house together, and Horatio took the framed picture off the wall, looking at it again, trying to memorize the face. He closed his eyes and still saw the other one. Al slipped an arm around his shoulders and gave him a sympathetic squeeze. "I will call you today. I'll let you know what's going on."  
  
Horatio ducked back under the crime scene tape, clutching the picture to his chest, and started walking down the street. He studied the picture as he walked. Who could destroy someone so beautiful? Who could have known her, yet hated her so much? His walk became a run, his run became a wild sprint, and he raced blindly down the street as hard as he could, trying to escape the events of the last day.  
  
But he did not cry.  
  
****  
  
Horatio abruptly realized that the hot water in the shower was rapidly turning to cold. He shut off the water and grabbed a towel. His mind felt ripped in different directions, and he had been standing under the water trying to sort them out. There was the familiar but still acutely painful impact of the memories of his mother's death. In 28 years, this annual reliving still hadn't gotten easier. But this morning, there was something else demanding his attention as well. Calleigh. He had gotten the best night's sleep he could ever remember having in the first week of April since his mother died, and when he had woken up, she had been there on the floor with one hand on his arm. He knew instantly that that hand had been his lifeline through the night. She had held away the worst of the dreams. Of course, he now felt guilty about her spending the night on the floor, although she had seemed very soundly asleep when he moved her. But beyond that, last night forced him to think more about his relationship with this petite blonde spitfire.  
  
Of course he was attracted to her. He had been attracted to her from the beginning, and learning her personality, working around her each day, the attraction only deepened. But the twin brakes that he held on any intimate relationship had been firmly in place. He did not want to be vulnerable, to be hurt again, but more than that, he did not want others to be hurt. And the track record for people he was close to getting killed was a very high percentage. His father had been the first. Horatio had been in the car accident with him. Another car had run them off a mountain road, and Horatio had been trapped in that car for seven hours with his dead father before they were found. Seven hours to wonder if he had distracted his father and contributed to the accident. Then his mother's death, which haunted him yearly. Ray, whom he had promised his mother's spirit he would take care of. Most recently, Al Humphries, who had become his best friend and mentor on the force. Horatio had concluded with Ray's death, and had had it reinforced with Al's, that he simply was not meant to have people love him. Everyone he loved died violently. Probably his ex-wife would have died if she hadn't saved herself by leaving him. And now Calleigh . . .  
  
Countering those thoughts, though, was the sweet, unaccustomed release of letting someone else be strong for once, letting himself be taken care of. He had been so tired last night that he probably couldn't have driven safely home, but he never would have admitted anything to her about the dreams if he hadn't been trapped into a situation where he couldn't deny it. Still, she had respected his wishes not to talk about them. And then she had sat there with him all night and held them back. Comforting. Frightening. He was the responsible one, the one who felt that he needed to take care of others. All of his life, since his father's death, he had had to be the strong one. He still remembered the probably well- intentioned woman at his father's funeral who had said to him, "You'll have to be the man of the family now." And so at age 7, that burden had crashed down on him. Only with his mother had he let go somewhat. To let someone else be the strong one, to simply admit that he had been at the end of his rope last night and couldn't have taken any more, was a new experience. He wondered if it would change how she saw him. From being the ever strong mentor-boss to being the one who had run straight into a desk and fallen over while wildly bolting from a nightmare. How would she deal with it?  
  
His mind felt torn in 50 different directions, and for once, he wasn't sure how the pieces were going to fit together. He finished dressing and shook himself mentally. Today, he had to put in some honest work on the case. He had been worthless yesterday, and he knew it. Today, he would pull his weight. But his mind already cringed at the thought of tonight. He had been through this 27 times previously, and he knew it wasn't over.  
  
****  
  
Calleigh marched around the corner into the autopsy room and stopped short. Horatio was already there. His eyes met hers, and he gave her his usual quirky smile. "Good morning. Sleep well?"  
  
"Yes, I did, actually. Quite well." She studied him. He looked 100% better than last night but still not normal. "How about you?"  
  
"Very well. Thank you." He turned back to Alexx. "Alexx was just explaining the findings on yesterday's victim. We might have a lead."  
  
"Yes, well, she died of a snapped neck. The killer had both hands around her throat, and there was some bruising up under the jaws, especially on the left."  
  
Calleigh nodded. "Thus making the killer right-handed."  
  
"Better still, we've got some traces of blood on her neck on the right side, about the location of the index finger. No skin break on the victim, so I think it must have come from the killer. He had a cut on that finger."  
  
"And with blood, we can get DNA," said Horatio. "Good work, Alexx. I didn't notice that yesterday at the scene."  
  
You were in shock and dead tired, Horatio. Cut yourself some slack, thought Calleigh. She said aloud, "Now all we need is a suspect to match it to."  
  
"I'm going to be talking to the husband later today, and I'll request a sample from him."  
  
Calleigh frowned. "Wouldn't the husband kill her at home?"  
  
"He'd have to stage a break-in to divert suspicion. He might have killed her in the alley to make it look like a mugging gone wrong. And there are some very interesting financial aspects; she held most of the property, not him. She was a rich heiress; he was an immigrant who made good. I'm not jumping to conclusions, but we have to consider him. I do think she knew the killer, since there were no signs of a struggle."  
  
"So he made money, but she had much more. Could be a motive," said Alexx. "One other thing I want to show you." She walked over to the sheeted body and pulled it back. Calleigh, watching, saw Horatio flinch, then focus tightly, concentrating on the face, on the differences. "Look at these throat bruises," said Alexx. She held her hand up to them; the finger marks were much farther apart than her hands. "Very large hands, I think. Definitely a man. You try it, Horatio."  
  
He backed up a step. "No, my hands aren't that much larger than yours. I think it's safe to say the killer had large hands." Horatio did in fact have only medium-sized, thin hands, but Alexx gave him an odd look. He half-turned away from the body. "Calleigh. What about the handkerchief and the gun you found yesterday?"  
  
"Nothing on the handkerchief, and I'm still working on the gun. No prints, though. The number has been filed off; I was reconstructing it last night." Before we got otherwise occupied, she thought. Horatio heard the thought and looked guilty.  
  
"No problem, finish it whenever you can. Alexx, Speed and Delko finished up their case yesterday, so I'll have Speed come down to get the DNA sample from the blood." He turned, managing not to face the body again, and left the room.  
  
Alexx looked back at Calleigh. "What's with him? Yesterday, he looked like a zombie, and today, he suddenly doesn't want to get close to a body. He usually isn't squeamish."  
  
"This particular victim happens to look a bit like his mother," said Calleigh.  
  
"Oh." There was a world of intonation behind the word. "No wonder he didn't come in to watch the autopsy yesterday. I'm sorry, I never would have uncovered her with him here if I knew. Poor guy."  
  
"Alexx, what happened to Horatio's parents? I was just wondering last night, I've never heard him mention either of them."  
  
"You just said the vic here looked like his mother."  
  
"I haven't ever asked him; I've just seen the picture on his desk." Alexx accepted that explanation, but Calleigh could see the wheels turning. Alexx was entirely too perceptive at times. She knew what Calleigh thought of Horatio, and Calleigh knew she knew.  
  
"Look, I'm not trying to be a busybody, and I'm not loading ammunition for my own cause. I really do have a reason that I need to know." She stopped short of telling Alexx about last night. That was too personal, and she was sure that Horatio didn't want it known. "Please, trust me on this. It really is important."  
  
Alexx considered for a moment, then said softly, "He never talks about it. Never. This is even more off limits than the subject of his brother."  
  
"Understood." Calleigh closed the distance between them a little, although there was no one in the room to overhear them.  
  
"His father died in a car accident when he was 7. Horatio was actually in the same accident, and he was trapped in the car with his dead father for hours before he was rescued." Calleigh's eyes opened wide, but the next statement was even more of a shock. "His mother was murdered when he was a teenager."  
  
Calleigh's heart stopped. "Murdered? Alexx, did Horatio see her killed?"  
  
"No, but he found the body."  
  
Oh, Horatio, thought Calleigh, her heart breaking. Finding your mother's body would give anyone nightmares. As would being trapped with your dead father for hours. She could find the file on the murder, though; CSI had archives. "Do you know her name?"  
  
"No. Like I said, it's not something he talks about."  
  
"When was this?"  
  
"He was 16 or 17, I think. I'm not sure of the exact date." Alexx cocked her head slightly. "Why do you suddenly need to know this today?"  
  
Calleigh sighed. "Alexx, I'd like to tell you. Really, I would. But I can't. Would you just accept my saying that there is a reason?"  
  
Their eyes met. "Sure, honey. But if you want to talk about it later, if you're able to talk about it, I'm here."  
  
"Thanks, Alexx. I'd better get to work."  
  
****  
  
Calleigh took out the gun she had been working on the night before, but with the other hand, she was making calls on her cell phone. She had to have a name and at least a rough date in order to track down the old murder file. Records that old weren't computerized, and she didn't want to take all day doing this, because she didn't really want Horatio to catch her at it. She started with Ray Caine, hoping that he was buried in a family plot. She did know the time of his death, about two months after she came to CSI. The first three cemeteries she called produced no results, but the records office at the fourth one found where Ray Caine was buried. It was indeed a family plot, the helpful woman said, and after a few moments, she had the data on others in the same plot. Howard Caine, died July 8, 1965, and Rosalind Caine, died April 3, 1975.  
  
Calleigh froze in the middle of writing down the dates. "Did you say April 3?"  
  
"Yes, April 3." Yesterday. Oh, Horatio.  
  
"Thanks," Calleigh said woodenly and hung up. She now had her answer, had the trigger. And she dearly wished it had been something else.  
  
****  
  
She thought she had all the pieces, now, but later on, at her lunch break, she realized that she still didn't know half of it. She found the old murder file in the basement archives of CSI. It shocked her. Even to someone who saw violent crime scenes every day, the photos were disturbing. That beautiful face had been absolutely destroyed. And Horatio had found her. And he relived it on the anniversary of her death. At least the case was closed. In fact, it had been closed fairly rapidly, in only a week.  
  
Wait a minute, she thought, suddenly furious with herself. How the hell did I miss this last year? If he relives it every anniversary, why didn't I notice? Two years ago at the beginning of April, she was just starting at CSI, but last year, not to have noticed was inexcusable. What case had she been working on that kept her from seeing his pain? Mentally kicking herself, Calleigh switched to the much faster computerized archives to find out what cases she was working last year at this time, what cases kept her from seeing what he was going through. She studied the records and felt her fury at herself change instantly to fury at someone else.  
  
Last year, the first week in April, Horatio had taken the entire week off on vacation. The year before, he had also taken the same week as vacation. He hadn't been at CSI three years ago, but she was sure if she searched the bomb squad records, she would find the same pattern. In fact, she remembered now that Horatio had originally been scheduled for a week's vacation this week. However, two of their CSIs had gotten married and were on their honeymoon, and last week, two others had gone in for emergency surgery, one for an appendectomy, one for a cholecystectomy. The department simply couldn't spare him, and he had cancelled with his usual calm demeanor. But for 27 years, up until this year, he had taken the first week in April off and spent it alone in his personal hell. Had he been there at that moment, she could have shaken him. Why, Horatio, why shut yourself off like that? You don't have to face it alone!  
  
Another thought came sliding in on the heels of that one. Why did he take the full week off? Why not just April 3rd and maybe the 4th to recover from the 3rd? It was actually quite rare for him to take a full week off. He got three weeks of vacation yearly, but he usually took it in bits and pieces, a day here and a day there. He didn't like to be gone too long. He had often said that this job was his life. So why schedule a full week away yearly? It could only be because it wasn't over yet. Calleigh went back to the original chart on his mother. It had taken four days to complete the investigation. The idea that Horatio had three more days like yesterday to get through appalled her. The idea that he had four days to get through like that yearly and had deliberately spent them alone for the past 27 years without telling anyone infuriated her.  
  
She filed the chart and went back upstairs. Five minutes left of her lunch break, and she had had nothing to eat. She was too mad to eat at the moment but decided to grab a cup of coffee. She went stalking into the break room, dropped her cup, and stared down at the shattered pieces. Sighing, she knelt to clean up the mess. She threw away the pieces, got a new cup and filled it, and suddenly realized that she was no longer alone in the break room. She hadn't heard him or, oddly, felt him, but that voice could only belong to one person, the object of her current fury.  
  
"Calleigh."  
  
She turned around.  
  
TBC. 


	4. Feraful Symmetry 4

Kept by ourselves in silence and apart, The secret anniversaries of the heart.  
  
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow  
  
****  
  
"Calleigh, I wanted to tell you . . . " Horatio broke off at the sight of her blazing eyes. "What's wrong?"  
  
"What's wrong? YOU'RE asking ME what's wrong?!?!?" Calleigh felt like grabbing his shoulders and banging his head against the wall to try to knock some sense into it.  
  
"What are you talking about?" The confusion in his eyes was real, and it made her even madder.  
  
Eric Delko came sailing into the break room, came to a screeching halt halfway to the coffee pot, and looked slowly from one to the other of them. "Uh. . . is everything okay?"  
  
"Fine," Calleigh snapped. "Horatio, could I talk to you in your office for a minute, please?" She had to get him to some more private location; you couldn't kill your boss in the break room with a coworker watching.  
  
"Sure." Ever the gentleman, he paused to let her precede him out the door. She grabbed his arm and half dragged him out of the break room and down the hall. Behind them, Delko stood staring, his cup of coffee forgotten.  
  
Calleigh managed to keep silent until they were in his office with the door safely shut. Then she exploded. "Just who the hell do you think you are, Horatio Caine? Are you trying to kill yourself before you reach 50?"  
  
"Calleigh, what . . ."  
  
"I've checked the records. Every year, you take this week off just so you can fall apart with no one else watching. You have to relive it all alone. 28 years, and you've spent it all alone. Can't you admit, just once, that you can't deal with something? That you need other people?"  
  
She saw the mental pieces click together instantly, but the look in his eyes surprised her. She had expected anger, fear at being found out, or denial. What she saw was even more pain than they had held before and a sort of shocked sense of injustice and betrayal. He said nothing. After a minute she went on.  
  
"Are you too proud to admit you can't deal with something? Is that it?" She knew that was wrong before the words were out of her mouth. Horatio's self-sufficiency had always seemed like a wall, even before she knew what was behind it. And a wall was only there to conceal something. Simple pride would not have required a front. He still said nothing, and Calleigh shifted tacks. "What is it, then? Why shut yourself off from the world?"  
  
He moved then, slowly walking around the corner of his desk and collapsing into the chair. His eyes shifted sideways, resting on the picture of his mother for a minute, as if he were memorizing her face, drinking in her features. My God, thought Calleigh, he doesn't remember what she looked like. He only remembers her face dead. Her anger drained away instantly, replaced by pure pity.  
  
"Look, I wasn't trying to drag out all your secrets to parade them in the open. I was just concerned about you. So I did some checking around today." He still just sat there looking at the picture. "Say something, Horatio. Yell at me if you want, but say something."  
  
He did not yell. His voice was even softer than usual, barely audible. "How did you piece it all together?"  
  
"I was looking at your picture last night, when I first found you asleep." She reached out to pick it up, then stopped at the momentary panic in his eyes and left it where he could see it. "Later, I was wondering what you would have nightmares about, what you could have seen that was so frightening. I thought maybe it had to do with your family, since you had never mentioned them. So today, I asked Alexx . . . "  
  
"You told Alexx about last night?" He was stunned.  
  
"No," she assured him quickly. "No one else knows about last night. I just asked her if she knew about your parents. I didn't tell her why. She's worried about you too, though. She knew something was wrong. Anyway, when she mentioned your mother, I got the date of her death by calling around to cemeteries. When I found out it was yesterday, I knew that was what you were dreaming about, so I pulled the file from the archives." She dropped into the visitor's chair to bring her eyes level with his. "I just wanted to know what you were going through, to share it with you." She shuddered herself, remembering those pictures.  
  
"You always were a good investigator." It was an effort to lighten the mood, but the smile was weak and never reached his eyes. "So you know everything."  
  
"No," she said firmly. "I've only seen a file. I can't imagine going through that in real life." His eyes went back to the picture, and she gave him a moment. "But, Horatio," she said finally, leaning forward a bit, "I'd like to share it. Not for my curiosity but for your sake. I want to be there for you. Why do you never share yourself without limits? Is it because you're afraid of getting hurt? Of being vulnerable?" That was part of the answer - she saw the partial acknowledgement in his eyes - but not the biggest part. "What is it, then?"  
  
His eyes went everywhere else in the room, not meeting hers, but she just sat waiting, letting the question hang there. She was terrified that he would just leave it hovering unanswered forever between them, but the next words had to come from him. Finally, he spoke so softly that she wasn't sure she had heard him correctly. "I'm afraid others will get hurt."  
  
"What?" She leaned forward slightly, trying to meet his eyes, and the intercom on his desk suddenly squawked into life.  
  
"Horatio."  
  
He cleared his throat and replied in his usual voice. "Yes."  
  
"Mr. Davis has arrived, and he's down in the interrogation room."  
  
"Thank you, Deanna. I'll be right down." He looked at his mother's picture for a long moment, then stood up slowly, moving like he was 90 instead of 45. His tiredness and pain went straight to Calleigh's heart. She wanted to touch him, to hug him, lend him some of her strength, yet was terrified that he would pull back.  
  
"Horatio?"  
  
He paused at the door and looked back at her. "What?" No more, the eyes pleaded. Don't ask me anything more.  
  
"What was it you were going to tell me?"  
  
His eyes met hers directly. "I wanted to thank you for helping me get through last night." He turned and left, leaving Calleigh sitting in the visitor's chair. Oh hell, she thought. The admission was a monumental step for him, a step he had been taking on his own, and she had dragged him to the edge of the mountain and thrown him off violently instead. She was suddenly angry again, and this time, all her fury was at herself.  
  
****  
  
Al Humphries and Horatio shared the couch in Al's living room, a mostly empty pizza box in between them. Al had had to practically force him to eat it, but once he started, he was hungry. Come to think of it, he couldn't remember the last time he ate. "Anyway," said Horatio, "I was thinking, what did she do yesterday? It's so strange for her to not let someone in. She would usually let anyone in, so maybe she had seen him earlier that day and knew to expect trouble. Or seen someone else connected to him." He gulped down a drink from the Coke on the coffee table. "So I tried to track down what she did yesterday. She usually works . . . worked in the mornings. She had a part-time job, but her boss said she called in yesterday and asked for the day off. She didn't mention anything about it to me, so she must have decided after Ray and I left for school."  
  
Or just not told you, thought Al, but the boy heard the thought and answered it. "She would have told me. Or I would have known she was keeping something back."  
  
"Did anything odd happen that morning before you left, then? Something that might have changed her mind?" Al pushed the pizza box toward Horatio. "Take that last piece." He could swear that the kid looked thinner than he had just a day ago, as if his frame had fallen in, and he didn't have much to spare. "Don't answer me for a second, just eat it and think about the question." Horatio had been thinking about the question all day and already had his answer, but Al wanted to give him a moment. He wondered again if he was doing the right thing. His superior would have a fit if he knew that Al was sharing the investigation with a 17-year-old kid, particularly a relative of the victim's, but Horatio needed to be doing something. There was such a fierce intensity in him, Al was afraid he would self-destruct without something productive to do. And he was actually helping. Al himself had long since stopped thinking of him as just a kid. Horatio had the sharpest mind and the best observation skills he had run into in a long time.  
  
Horatio finished the last piece of pizza and sat back. "We always talked for half an hour in the mornings, before Ray got up. The only thing unusual from yesterday was that we were both concerned about Ray's new friends."  
  
"What new friends?"  
  
"There's a group at school, not quite a gang really, but they associate with one sometimes. A real gang, I mean, of kids not in school. On the outside. It's that level we were afraid Ray would get to. They're into drugs, I think."  
  
"So she was afraid of your brother's new friends' friends?"  
  
"Right. I don't know how she would have known where to find them, but what if she went looking for the gang, to tell them to stay away from Ray? One of them followed her home, then went back to report to the rest of them, and the leader broke in later to kill her." He gulped down another swallow of Coke.  
  
"Why do you think there was a delay between them following her home and the attack? Why not break in then?"  
  
"She was doing dishes. She'd been home a while."  
  
Al shook his head again in admiration; he'd forgotten the dishes. He leaned forward a bit. "Horatio, do you know the names of these kids?"  
  
"The ones in the gang, no. Wouldn't they have nicknames?" Al nodded, and Horatio went on. "I'd know several of them by sight; they come around school way before class to deal drugs, and I see them on street corners sometimes. The kids still in school, the in-between gang, I know. Those are the ones Ray was starting to hang out with."  
  
"Write down their names, and their parents' names if you know them." Al passed over a pad and a pen. "Tell me something, can you honestly see your mother doing that? Going out to face down a drug-dealing gang alone?"  
  
Horatio hesitated for a long moment, finishing writing the list. "Yes," he said finally. "She had more courage than anyone I know." He gulped down the last of his drink, and Al stood up, taking the glass.  
  
"I'll go get us a refill, okay?" He put a hand on Horatio's shoulder for a minute, then picked up the glasses and went into the kitchen. Horatio heard the phone ring but tuned out the one-sided conversation that followed. Such a normal thing, answering the phone. He wondered if his life would ever get back to normal again. Probably not, he decided, because she would never be there again. He sat staring into space for several minutes, then picked up the empty pizza box. Slowly he folded the cardboard box in half, then folded it again, then again, compacting it down further each time, applying all the pressure he could until he was left with one tight square at the end, then still tried to compress it even further, making it smaller, forcing out all the air, trying to make it into nothing.  
  
But he did not cry.  
  
****  
  
"Horatio?" Calleigh spoke softly, and she stayed in the door of his office. He was at his desk, staring at the hourglass which had been given to him by Belle King. She knew he wasn't asleep, but his eyes were totally unfocused, and she didn't want to startle him back to himself too quickly this time. There had to be a limit to the number of times he could run into his desk without hurting himself. "Horatio."  
  
Finally, his head lifted, and his eyes focused. If she had had any doubts at all that his ordeal hadn't ended with last night, they were dispelled when he met her eyes. She held a cup of coffee in each hand, and she placed one on his desk, saying, "I brought you a peace offering."  
  
He half smiled. "None needed, but I never turn down a cup of coffee."  
  
"I know." She dropped into the chair across from him and took a sip from her own cup. "How did the interview with Mr. Davis go?"  
  
"He said he did have an alibi for all night the night before last, but he refused to tell who it was. Too much of a gentleman, he said." The last word was dripping with sarcasm.  
  
"But you don't believe him." It wasn't a question.  
  
"He's hiding something, Calleigh. And his grief rang hollow to me. He did give a DNA sample, though. Speed's going to compare it to the blood on the victim."  
  
"Might be an easy wrap-up then." He shook his head, then took a few more swallows of coffee.  
  
"Something's not right, though. All of the pieces aren't there yet. I think he's involved, but I'm not sure he did it."  
  
"We'll get it worked out, eventually," she reassured him. "We always do." He finished off his cup of coffee, and Calleigh stood up, taking the empty mug along with her own. "Actually, I came in to say good night. I'm wrapping it up for the day."  
  
"Is it quitting time?" He looked at his own watch and was surprised to find that it read 7:30.  
  
"Long past."  
  
"You get a good night's sleep tonight, Calleigh. At home, in bed."  
  
"I intend to," she assured him. "Don't work too late yourself, you hear?"  
  
"Not much longer." He pulled the file on his desk back over toward him.  
  
"See you tomorrow, then."  
  
"See you tomorrow."  
  
Calleigh left his office and went back to the break room to wash both cups. She knew that Horatio would never let her stay with him tonight. He blamed himself that she had spent last night on the floor. He was far too perceptive to accept a lie, so she had told him the honest truth about her plans. Tonight, she did intend to go home and sleep in her own bed, which is why she had laced the coffee she had given him with a heavy dose of Seconal.  
  
She waited 20 minutes, clearing up the last of the day's clutter from her work area, then slipped back down to his office. She crossed over to him and took his pulse. It was a bit slow, but strong and steady. Reassured that he was safely out for the next several hours, she arranged his arms as comfortably as she could and pillowed his head on them. She caught Rosalind smiling at her from the picture on his desk and smiled back. "Tell me, Rosalind, was he as hard headed when he was a kid?" She smoothed a stray lock of red hair down, then, unable to resist, she bent over and kissed him. "Horatio Caine, you are the finest man I've ever known. And the biggest fool at times." She stood there stroking his hair for a moment, then reluctantly backed away to keep her own promise. At the door of the office, she looked back at him, just watching him breathe for a few minutes. "Good night, Horatio. Sleep well." She switched out the light and left. 


	5. Fearful Symmetry 5

"Just a piece in a jigsaw puzzle. A missing piece."  
  
Orson Welles, Citizen Kane (screenplay)  
  
****  
  
The Miami police headquarters hummed like a giant organism, never still. Horatio stood in the open door of the interrogation room and watched, fascinated. The restless energy of the place appealed to him. He saw Al coming back down the hall with a picture file box in his hands. Another officer, one who had also been at the scene, waylaid him. Their conversation was too far away for Horatio to hear, but the disagreement was there. And judging from the looks in his direction, he was the subject of it. Finally, Al came on alone.  
  
"Trouble?"  
  
Al closed the door securely. "Superintendent Wilson has his own ideas for pursuing this case. He's on robbery gone wrong."  
  
"But that's not how it happened." Horatio couldn't understand how anyone could look at the evidence and not see the personal motive.  
  
"I know, but he's my boss, so I have to listen to him." Al set the box of pictures on the table. "Now, look through these and try to pick out the members of the drug gang."  
  
Horatio took out a handful of pictures and started going through them. Al watched him, once again intrigued by his young friend. There was no hesitation, no second glance or consideration, yet no hurry. Each picture was thoroughly looked at once, only once, then turned over and set aside neatly in a stack. Occasionally, he set one on the other side of him. The efficiency of it, the rapidity of his conclusions, was so much the antithesis of the usual witness looking at pictures. It took him less than ten minutes to look through 200 pictures of known gang members. Not once did he break the rhythm of his task. "These eight are in the gang, and this one here is the leader." He looked up to find Al's eyes on him, not the pictures. "What is it?"  
  
"Never mind." The kid really didn't know, could see nothing odd about his way of looking at the world. What a gift, a mind like that! "Are you sure about the identification?" It was a standard question asked to all witnesses, but Horatio was almost offended. He didn't look back down at the pictures, either. Not even a glance to verify his first opinion.  
  
"Of course I'm sure. I've seen them all several times." But he had seen them before the crime, hadn't known it would be significant. Even witnesses seeing criminals during a crime usually gave it some deliberation before pronouncing their identity.  
  
"Okay." Al pulled the chosen eight pictures over. "This one is the leader?"  
  
"Yes." No doubt at all in Horatio's eyes or voice.  
  
"Toro Jackson."  
  
"Toro? Bull?"  
  
"Just a nickname, but it fits him. We've suspected him of everything under the sun, but no hard proof yet." Al was starting to get excited, like a hunting dog who spies the quarry up a tree at the end of the chase. "But we may have him this time, if he is involved. Your mother fought like a tiger. He'll have wounds, and we can match the blood type from the remnants found under her fingernails."  
  
"And that's conclusive? To a jury, I mean?"  
  
"Not 100%. Some day we'll have lots better ways to deal with matching a suspect to a crime, I'm sure. Science goes further every year. But the blood type, if it matches, coupled with the wounds - that would be a pretty good case. Now if we only had a final nail for his coffin, something no lawyer in the world could weasel him out of." He suddenly looked up. "Horatio, was anything missing from that house?"  
  
"It wasn't robbery," Horatio insisted.  
  
"I know it wasn't. But if he spotted something he wanted, right there for the taking, he would grab it on his way out. Guns? Anything a gang member might like?"  
  
"We have a few guns, but we didn't keep them in the kitchen. And I don't think he went out of there. There was too much blood; it would have been tracked into the other rooms." He shuddered slightly, seeing it again.  
  
"You didn't notice anything missing from the kitchen?"  
  
"I'm sorry, Al. I really wasn't looking for it. The first time, I only saw her." He paused for a moment, and Al saw his hands, suddenly restless, lock into each other. "The second time, I was looking for how the fight progressed, how it all happened. I wasn't taking inventory." He sounded apologetic, and Al leaned across the table and covered Horatio's hands with his own.  
  
"Nobody could expect you to see any more than you did." Horatio looked up at the touch. "But are you willing to take one more look around? Just to make sure?"  
  
"Okay." He stood up, and Al boxed the remaining pictures, all except the chosen eight, which he stuck in his pocket.  
  
"Is it always like this?" Horatio asked as they walked out.  
  
"Is what always like this?"  
  
"Headquarters." He waved a hand at the activity all around them.  
  
"Pretty much. Miami's a big city and getting bigger all the time. I know it looks a bit chaotic to an outsider, though."  
  
"It doesn't look chaotic," said Horatio. "Lots of patterns are there, but I don't know which patterns they are. There are patterns, though. All working together. It's just frustrating not to know the details of them, like seeing an anthill only from the top."  
  
Al was silent while they got into his police cruiser, then looked across at his passenger as they stopped at the first red light. "Horatio, have you ever thought of being a police officer?"  
  
Horatio considered it, his head cocked slightly to one side. "It hadn't occurred to me."  
  
"You're 17. What are you thinking of doing with your life? You must have thought about it."  
  
Horatio smiled. "I hadn't quite decided. The thing I'm best at is designing things, sorting stuff out. Ray thinks I ought to be an engineer. But somehow that isn't it. I'm good at it, but it's too impersonal." He hesitated for a moment, then added, "Mom always said I needed a mission and hadn't found it yet."  
  
Al studied him. He would make a brilliant engineer, yet the first thought Al had was, what a waste. "You're good at this investigative work, Horatio. Really good. And that would be helping people, not just working with variables on paper." Horatio's head was still tilted slightly, his eyes looking into nothing, studying how that idea might fit into his life. They passed the rest of the trip in silence.  
  
The little white house already looked forlorn and empty, not just the crime scene tape around it, but the whole air of the place. The grass was still neatly mowed, the flowers still crisp, but one might easily think that no one had ever lived there. Al and Horatio ducked under the crime scene tape, and Horatio unlocked the door. He walked straight to the kitchen door, then stopped, staring at the place where his mother's body had been for a moment. Finally, he tilted his head slightly and hit the room with one sweeping glance, wall to wall. When he turned back to Al, his eyes were shining like blue stars. "My grandfather's knife is gone."  
  
"What knife?"  
  
"It's a relic, from World War II. A German knife. He brought it home, and he gave it to my dad. My mom used it as a letter opener. It sat in the mail stand there on the counter, across the hooks at the bottom." The two of them locked eyes, sharing the triumph. "We've got him!"  
  
"We've got him," Al agreed. "If he has the knife, and if he has the wounds and the right blood type, any jury in Florida would convict on that evidence."  
  
"So let's go get him." Horatio was outside and halfway to the police car when Al caught him, spinning him around.  
  
"What do you mean, let's? Here's where you get off this train, Horatio."  
  
"I want to be there, to see it finished." His eyes pleaded, but Al was unyielding.  
  
"Facing this gang down herself was your mother's mistake. You are not going to repeat it. This could be dangerous, and from this point on is where training counts for more than observation." He opened the door of the police car. "Come on, I'll drop you off and then go get a warrant."  
  
"I'm seeing this through."  
  
"Absolutely not," said Al. "You won't win this fight, because you aren't going to be in it. Now get in the car, Horatio."  
  
The boy shook his head, backing up a step. His jaw was dead set and stubborn. "No."  
  
"Get in, Horatio. I'm taking you home."  
  
Horatio's eyes, themselves as cold as World War II daggers, locked with Al's. "This is my home," he said. He turned and vanished into the house. Al took one step after him, and the radio in his police car crackled into life. "Damn," he swore softly. He turned and went to the car.  
  
****  
  
Calleigh got to CSI about 5:00 AM, having slept as if drugged herself. She wanted to check on Horatio before the rest of the team arrived. The Hummer was still in the CSI garage, she saw with relief. He probably shouldn't be driving yet. She took the back stairs by his office, but the office was empty.  
  
She found him in the break room, sitting at the table with shoulders half slumped, working on his third cup of coffee. He looked up at her as she came in, his pupils still so dilated that his blue eyes looked black. "What did you give me last night?"  
  
"Seconal," she said. "I have a supply of it, left over from the aftermath of a relationship gone wrong. I kept it on hand for emergencies."  
  
"I am not an emergency." He took another gulp of coffee, then shook his head, trying to clear it.  
  
Calleigh didn't even touch that one. "I was just trying to fulfill your wishes." He looked up at her with the ghost of his usual head tilt. "You wanted me to get a good, sound night's sleep. I did, knowing that you were, too."  
  
He sighed. "Remind me in a few hours, when I have the energy, to discuss that logic with you."  
  
"Come on," said Calleigh. "It's only 5:00 AM, but I came in to take you home so you could shower and change. You probably shouldn't drive for a few more hours." She tugged slightly at his arm. "Come on, let's get out of here before the rest of the world comes in."  
  
He stood up slowly, still not entirely steady on his feet, which gave her an excuse to grip his arm while they walked down to the garage. "And while you're taking a shower, I'll get breakfast cooked." She glanced at him sideways as they pulled out into traffic. "Did you ever eat anything at all yesterday?"  
  
"I don't remember," he said. He leaned his head back against the headrest, closing his eyes. The drug was still putting up a fight with his consciousness.  
  
"Where do you live?" She had always wondered, but she had never asked him, knowing that she could not have asked the question casually. He gave her the address without opening his eyes, and she maneuvered the car through the early morning traffic, perversely enjoying the opportunity to be in the driver's seat with him the passenger for once.  
  
****  
  
CSI was buzzing like a mosquito swarm when they returned at about 8:00. "H," called Speed, spotting them as they entered the lab. "I just finished the DNA samples. It matches! Davis' DNA is a definite match for the blood on the victim's body."  
  
"Good job," said Horatio. "All right, we'll pull in Davis again and see what his precious alibi says to that." His mind was functioning again, sorting out the evidence, building the puzzle. "He has large hands, too."  
  
"And a cut on the left index finger?" said Speed.  
  
"I'll check that, but I never had a chance to see yesterday. He never turned his hands over. With a DNA match, we can push him now." He swung around, looking almost like his old self. "Calleigh, what about the gun?"  
  
The gun. "Oh gosh, I'm sorry, Horatio. I got involved in other things yesterday and forgot all about it."  
  
"What?" Speed couldn't believe it. "What distracts you from a gun?"  
  
"None of your business," she said pertly. "I'll get right on it, Horatio."  
  
"Keep me posted. I'll call for a warrant on Davis." He turned away from them and headed for his office, walking like a tiger, cat-footed but purposefully, moving with his usual grace.  
  
"Well, he's back," said Speed. "What's been wrong with him the last couple of days?"  
  
"Something on his mind, I guess," said Calleigh. "I've got to get to work on that gun." She left Speed looking from his retreating boss to his retreating coworker. H wrapped up in something other than work and Calleigh forgetting about a gun. What was wrong with everybody this week?  
  
****  
  
It took most of the morning for Calleigh to reconstruct the gun number, and when she did, it was a dead end. No connection to the victim, her husband, or anyone else traceable for the last ten years. Remember, she told herself, quoting Horatio, we're not wasting time on dead ends, we're narrowing down the case to what matters. She left a message for Horatio, but she still hadn't seen him by lunchtime. She and Alexx went out to eat together at a little restaurant around the corner, and when she got back, there still wasn't any sign of him. He's just tied up questioning Davis, she told herself. She knew that he was feeling better today, thanks to Seconal, but the nagging voice in the back of her head was still chewing over her discoveries of yesterday. He always took a week off, a full week, and today only made three days. And what on earth was she going to do with him tonight? Hit him over the head? It would be next to impossible to drug him again, she knew.  
  
By 3:00 PM, with still no sign of him, she threw caution to the winds and hooked the first person she saw in the lab, who happened to be Delko. "Eric, do you know where Horatio is? I haven't seen him since this morning? Have they been talking to Davis all this time?" She couldn't believe that. DNA evidence was the absolute, unequivocal witness. Why would questioning a suspect with a direct DNA tie to the evidence be difficult?  
  
"He went to Daytona Beach."  
  
"What?" It was a four and a half hour drive, nine round trip. He shouldn't be doing that this week, she felt like shouting.  
  
"Davis' alibi. Turns out he's got a beauty of one. He says he spent the night with a woman in a hotel there."  
  
"That's a beauty of an alibi?"  
  
"Thing is, he produced all sorts of people, hotel staff and such, who he says will remember him. It wasn't just the woman. He says lots of people saw him there."  
  
"Wouldn't he conduct an affair discretely?"  
  
Eric rolled his eyes. "Calleigh, it's 2003. His wife probably was just waiting for him to leave so she could get going with her boyfriend."  
  
"Despite your opinions, Eric, marriage does work sometimes."  
  
"You think it did here?"  
  
Well, no, she thought. Probably Eric was right. Horatio had said last night that the husband's grief rang hollow. "So Horatio went up to check out the alibi. Did anybody go with him?"  
  
"No." Delko looked at her oddly. "You know how he gets, like a dog with a bone. He wanted to pick it apart himself. He's sure Davis is lying."  
  
"When did he leave?"  
  
"While you were at lunch. 12:30, maybe?"  
  
"Thanks, Eric." 12:30. Plus a nine hour drive round trip. Plus at least a couple of hours of questioning people. But it was the drive back that froze Calleigh's heart. What would happen when his memories became stronger than one good night's sleep in three days? She had seen how they consumed his attention. Horatio, she told him fiercely, if you get yourself killed, I'll never forgive you.  
  
****  
  
"I'm afraid others will get hurt."  
  
Calleigh paced around Horatio's house, waiting for him, worrying about him, chewing over the events of this week. That was his reason for shutting himself off, he had said. He was afraid other people would get hurt. She had filed the remark mentally but hadn't had time to mull over it yet.  
  
How on earth could letting people get close to him hurt them? Horatio was the kindest, most generous, most honest person she had ever met. Surely he could only benefit people's lives. Yet he said it was for their sake that he withdrew. It just didn't make sense.  
  
She came to a halt in the middle of his living room and looked around. She had never seen it until that morning, but the whole room, this whole house was flavored with his esteem of other people. There were several pictures on the wall, including at least one of his mother in every room. It would have been touching if it hadn't been pathetic, if she hadn't seen in his eyes for a moment yesterday that he honestly could not remember what she looked like. Calleigh crossed to the piano that stood against one wall of the living room. There was another thing she hadn't expected. Rosalind's piano, she was sure; there was a picture of her playing that same piano displayed on top of it. But could Horatio play it? Was it just a memento, or was it a connection, something he and his mother had shared? She hadn't asked him questions that morning, too concentrated on getting him to eat for what she was sure was the first time in days. She tried to imagine Horatio playing the piano and could do it without much trouble.  
  
There were also pictures of Horatio's father. Seeing him, Calleigh was able to sort out the influences on his son. Horatio's father had the same red hair and blue eyes, but it was Rosalind who had stamped her son's face. Horatio really looked nothing like her superficially, but the expression, the set of the jaw, the directness, was all hers. She studied the pictures of his father again. Howard Caine, died July 8th, she remembered. Calleigh made a mental note to herself to double check the records and see if Horatio took July 8th off every year. Trapped in the car with him for hours, Alexx had said. What a thing for a kid only 7.  
  
There were also the pictures of Ray. Calleigh had not known Ray, only known of him, and she was curious about these. Ray somehow never looked happy. In the family shots, he was the restless one. What would it be like to have Horatio as an older brother, she wondered? A perfect older brother, because Horatio was perfect, naturally. She felt a wisp of sympathy for Ray before worry for Horatio overtook her again. She studied Horatio in the family shots. Prior to his father's death, he had looked relaxed and happy. Never again, though. With his mother, he came closest, but the burden of responsibility had fallen hard on him. She knew how much he felt driven to take care of people, how much he wanted to protect every family of every victim they encountered. It seemed unfair that someone who cared so much about people had suffered so much loss.  
  
Calleigh couldn't analyze things like Horatio, but at that instant, she felt the mental puzzle click suddenly into place, got a brief glimpse of what he lived daily. Of course, she thought. Everyone he has loved is dead. He thinks he's some sort of cosmic jinx on humanity.  
  
That explained things. Boy, did that explain things. Like how caring and expressive he was with families of victims, with people he could absolutely identify with yet would never see again, while he could not open up to people he interacted with daily. He was afraid to let people too close, not just because he was afraid of being hurt, but because he was afraid they would die for loving him. Oh, Horatio, she thought. Step back and analyze that for a minute. Coincidences happen; we see them all the time. It isn't your fault they're dead. How could you possibly be to blame for it?  
  
The small clock on the wall stuck midnight. Calleigh returned to her mental math. If he left at 12:30, and the drive was 9 hours round trip, he had only had two and a half to question people. Too short, she knew. It was too early to expect him home, but she knew that she had to wait here for him. She needed to see him as soon as possible, to reassure herself that he was alright. The thought of that drive home terrified her. Once again, she began her pacing circuit of the living room.  
  
****  
  
The lights of the Hummer splashed against the wall as it turned into the driveway, waking Calleigh up out of a restless sleep. She bounded up from the couch and looked out the window, wanting to see him as soon as possible. And that was stupid; the car obviously hadn't driven itself home, so what difference would 10 seconds make? A lot, she told herself, still pressed to the window. She glanced at her watch, glowing in the darkened room. It was 3:00 AM.  
  
Horatio got out of the vehicle but just stood there leaning against it for a second, as if he didn't have the strength to walk inside. She could not see him clearly, but even the silhouette spoke volumes. The set of his shoulders, the droop of his head, his weary, flat-footed gait when he finally did move. Every line of his body spoke of failure, professionally, personally, in every way possible. Calleigh slumped against the window herself, biting her lip to keep from crying at the sight of him.  
  
The door opened, and he switched on the light, then stood there looking at her. She stood up squarely and faced him.  
  
"What are you doing here?" His voice was hoarse, as if he had been talking for hours, which he probably had, she thought, remembering the case. His face looked like skin stretched over a skeleton, and his eyes, his beautiful blue eyes, were dull, with no spark of life at all.  
  
"I wanted to be sure you made it home alright," she said.  
  
He took a few steps into the living room to clear the door, then leaned back against it until he heard it click firmly. "Calleigh, go home."  
  
"No," she said firmly.  
  
"Please." It was a plea. "Go home."  
  
"No," she said, her whole heart crying at the sight of him. "Horatio, look at me." His eyes met hers, but there was still no life in them. "I'm not going home. I'm not walking away and leaving you here. There is no way you're going to get rid of me, do you hear? I'm stuck in your life, and there's nothing that will shake me loose. I'm not leaving you, I'm not turning away, and I'm not going to die."  
  
She saw a slight spark in his eyes at her last statement. They stood there looking at each other for a long moment. Every inch of her body wanted to go to him, but he had to be the one to close the gap. She was never sure how long they stood like that, a second or half an eternity. Then slowly he came to her, wrapping both arms around her, burying his face in the top of her hair. She hugged him as tightly as she could, wanting him to feel the strength of her grip, half holding him on his feet. Neither of them said anything; neither needed to. 


	6. Fearful Symmetry 6

"The pelting of this pitiless storm."  
  
William Shakespeare, King Lear  
  
****  
  
Calleigh came back into Horatio's living room with two cups of coffee, and he looked up at her from where he was collapsed on the couch. "You ought to get some sleep yourself. You could have the bed."  
  
"No way," she replied. "I was asleep when you got home. I'm fine." She offered him one of the cups, then grinned when he hesitated. "It's just coffee. I swear."  
  
She wouldn't lie to him. He accepted the cup and took a few swallows.  
  
"I do still have some Seconal, though, if you want," she offered.  
  
"No, we've got to be at work in a couple of hours. There's a limit to how long Davis can be held without formally charging him. We've got to get this case solved today."  
  
"To hell with the case." Looking at Horatio right then, she honestly wouldn't have minded if Davis got away.  
  
He chuckled. "No, we can't do that. Mrs. Davis deserves justice, and her family deserves closure. You're only thinking about me." The fact that he even could think about someone else when he was going through what he was made her love him even more.  
  
"Guilty," she admitted. She sat down on the couch next to him, then slid over so he could rest his head on her shoulder instead of on the cushioned back. "The alibi checks out, then?"  
  
"It's perfect. I spent five hours trying to break it, and not even a glimmer. He was tipping people with $50 bills. It's almost like he wanted to be remembered. But he definitely was there." He finished off his coffee. "DNA evidence is the absolute witness, Calleigh. And in this case, it's wrong. But I swear the man is involved somehow. How could he leave blood from a cut he doesn't have at a crime scene when he was four hours away?"  
  
"Star Trek transporter," she suggested. He half smiled, and she slipped around behind him a little bit, massaging his shoulders. The muscles were so knotted that it almost hurt her hands. "Why don't you try to get a little sleep? I'll be here."  
  
"I know, but it won't work tonight, Calleigh. Trust me, I won't be able to stay asleep tonight."  
  
She continued rubbing his shoulders, still amazed that he let her be this close to him. Was it only because he was too exhausted to protest, or had he honestly come to some new decision? "Horatio, how much longer does this go on?"  
  
"Just today," he said. "This is the last day." She gave up on his shoulders and pulled his head over into her lap, massaging his temples gently. He closed his eyes, but she quickly discovered that he was right. What had worked a few days ago, the physical contact, would not hold off the dreams tonight. He would barely drop off to sleep before they started gnawing at his mind, and he would snap back awake with a jerk to escape them. The 10 seconds of sleep that he managed to get here and there wasn't enough to do any good.  
  
"Now you know why I always take this week off," he said without opening his eyes.  
  
"Tomorrow," said Calleigh, "I mean today, I'm going to put in a vacation request of my own, and I want you to approve it."  
  
"You want some time off?" He opened his eyes and twisted around so that he could half sit up and face her.  
  
"Yes. The first week of April, next year."  
  
His eyes were grateful. "You think you can keep me from going through this?"  
  
"Probably not, but I'm going to share it with you."  
  
He sat up all the way. "Calleigh, I've got a lousy track record."  
  
"Believe it or not, Handsome, mine isn't sterling."  
  
He grinned at her, but it faded after a moment. His eyes remained locked on her face. "I don't want you to get hurt."  
  
"Think about it a minute, Horatio. No one is a walking jinx. You've had a horrible life in a lot of ways, but it isn't because of you."  
  
"Do you actually know anybody who just happens to have had all of his close relatives or friends die violently?"  
  
"Yes," she said instantly. "You." She stood up, gathered the cups, and went into the kitchen for a refill. When she came back, he was still staring at the same corner he had been when she left. "Horatio," she said softly. After a moment, his eyes came back to her. "I realize now what you're trying to do, but look at it another way. Do you have the right to make people's decisions for them, to hold them away? Even if it did mean being hurt, and I'm not conceding that point, the opportunity to know you, be with you would almost be worth it. You never give people the choice. Do you really think that your father, or your mother, or any of the others, if they had known they would die, would rather change things and never have known you at all?"  
  
His eyes suddenly focused tightly, sharply. Something in his tired mind had clicked, almost audibly. "What is it?" Calleigh sat back down next to him and handed him his cup.  
  
"That's the last thing my mother ever said to me. That she wouldn't change anything about her life, that I was worth it. I haven't thought of that in years." For one second, remembering her saying it, he could see her as she had been, the beautiful, unmarred face. Then the other version flashed on his consciousness again, but it was at least a glimpse. It was more than he had had in the 28 years since her death. Calleigh slipped back close to him and pulled his head over to her shoulder again. Please, God, she thought, let this ordeal be over for him soon. He settled against her, accepting the contact, but his muscles were still tense, his body still wired. She gave up trying to relax him and simply held him, waiting for the morning, waiting for the end of this eternal week.  
  
****  
  
The team convened in the lab at CSI, with Speed the last to arrive. He took one look at Horatio, who had lost track of which cup of coffee he was currently working on, and said, "Geez, H, what time did you get back from Daytona?"  
  
"Not until a few hours ago." True, as far as it went. He gulped the last of his coffee and set the cup down. "Okay, Davis' lawyer is starting to push for release. We've got to get this case settled today. The problem is, the alibi is perfect. No question that he was there that night, all night long." He frowned slightly. "It's too good an alibi, really. Can anybody here produce 20 independent witnesses to your actions a few nights ago?"  
  
"He knew something was going to happen," said Delko. "Hit man, maybe?"  
  
"The DNA is the problem, though," said Speed. "I double-checked the results again yesterday afternoon. No question. That blood is his."  
  
"But from where?" mused Horatio. "He doesn't have a cut on his left index finger, or on any other finger. Alexx, are you sure that blood couldn't have come from somewhere else?"  
  
She shook her head. "It's too small an amount, and it was in a fairly clean line. Not smeared at all. I'd swear it came from a cut on that finger on the murderer."  
  
"Are we sure Davis is involved? Maybe he's just feeling guilty about the affair."  
  
"He's involved," said Horatio. "I'm positive of that. But he didn't do it. He was over four hours away."  
  
"So how does his DNA get there at the scene?" asked Speed. "In spite of his alibi, that places him there. It's the ultimate tie to the scene, because it is impossible for two people to have the same DNA."  
  
Horatio's head tilted suddenly, and his eyes sharpened. "No, it's not."  
  
"What?" The group in the lab couldn't have been more shocked if he had said that the world was flat. "No way," said Speed. "DNA is absolutely unique."  
  
"With one exception," said Horatio. "Identical twins. One egg, which then subdivides. They are exact genetic copies of each other." They were all silent for a moment, letting that idea soak in.  
  
"Does Davis have an identical twin brother?" said Calleigh.  
  
"He has to," said Horatio. "It's the only thing that makes sense. What we have to do is find him, and we're going to turn every computer database we've got inside out today looking. All right, people, let's get to it." He started to leave himself, then stopped after one step and picked up his empty coffee cup, taking it with him.  
  
****  
  
Al was worried about Horatio. His friend must have simply walked through the house and out the back, because when Al entered a few minutes later, the house was empty. He hadn't seen Horatio since. Of course, the kid might just be walking off some frustration, but remembering that set jaw, Al didn't think so. He hoped Horatio wasn't going after the gang on his own. All the while he was convincing his superior, then getting the warrant, he was fuming at the legal channels required. Something might be happening out there now, and his feelings went far beyond just the duty of enforcing the law. Horatio had really gotten under his skin the last few days.  
  
Finally, with the warrant in hand, Al and two other officers set out for the gang's turf. Toro Jackson had a sort of headquarters in an old building in one of the worst parts of town. The police came in quietly, without sirens, hoping to catch their quarry off guard. It was early afternoon, and they hoped to catch Toro resting up for an evening of trouble. School wasn't even out yet, so it was too early to be pushing drugs to kids.  
  
"Miami-Dade police!" They burst into the building with guns raised. Four gang members were there, ogling pictures in a magazine, and they froze as the officers poured into the building. "Check the rest of the place," said Wilson, nodding to Al. He took a quick look through the building, finding nobody, but the place made him uneasy. There were too many dark corners and large crates with tunnels between them, and there was probably at least one secret entrance. Still, he found no signs of anybody.  
  
"All clear, I think, but this place gives me the willies," Al reported when he returned to the main cleared area. "Let's get him down to headquarters as soon as we can."  
  
"Toro Jackson," said Wilson, nodding to the leader. "We have a warrant here for your arrest as a suspect in the murder of Rosalind Caine." He read him his rights briefly. "Stand up slowly, and walk backwards toward us." As Toro stood up, the ugly scratches down his forearms and on the side of his face stood out. Al and Wilson locked eyes and nodded. Al handcuffed Toro, while the other two still covered the remaining gang members.  
  
"I'll be seeing you later today, guys," said Toro saucily. "These pigs got nothing." They started to walk out, still keeping an eye on the other three.  
  
"Hold it." Al froze, not just at the voice but at a steel cold muzzle pressed into his side. From one of the many side tunnels between the crates, another gang member stepped out, pushing Al back into the open room with his gun. "Toro ain't going nowhere." He pressed hard on the gun for emphasis. The muzzle was buried in Al's flesh. If he fired from this range, the bullet would cut him in half. "Now then, get those cuffs off."  
  
"Drop it." The voice had such commanding authority that everyone in the room turned instantly. Horatio stood at the edge of one of the side tunnels opposite. He had a 30-30 deer rifle in his hands, holding it like he knew how to use it, aiming straight for the one holding a gun on Al.  
  
"It's just a kid, Taz," said Toro, then caught a glimpse of Horatio's eyes. They were as hard and piercing as lasers, and every inch of his body was fiercely taut. He commanded the room at that moment, and not just because of the gun. "He won't fire," said Toro, but his voice shook on the words.  
  
"I will," said Horatio with a frightening softness to his tone. "You killed my mother, and you're threatening my friend. And I'm going to blow your head off in five seconds." It wasn't a threat but a promise. Every person there, including the police, believed him. The 17-year-old kid and the hardened gang member locked eyes, and Taz froze at the cold blue fire. In that moment, he was afraid of this kid, and he knew that Toro knew he was afraid, and he didn't care. He stepped back, gently setting the gun down.  
  
Al cuffed him, then turned back quickly to talk Horatio down before he killed somebody. He saw instantly that it wasn't needed, though. The dangerous edge, the cold fierceness had only been there for the moment they were needed. They had vanished completely. The boy was still holding the gun, helping to cover the others, but he was once again only a kid, not a threat.  
  
"Call for backup," said Wilson. "We're taking in everyone. No, stay here, Al. Gates, go get on the radio." Al realized, with amusement, that his superior wanted him here to deal with Horatio in case he went homicidal again. On second thought, he couldn't blame him. That fierce energy had been terrifying. The kid really would have done it, Al was sure.  
  
Gates returned, and they all stood there, waiting. The police moved the gang members into the center of the room, then backed up until they had crates against their backs. No one else was going to be surprised. "Come over here, Horatio," said Al, "but don't . . . " He broke off halfway through the unneeded warning as Horatio took the long way around, not crossing between the police and the gang. Al gave him a quick pat on the shoulder, then returned to steadily covering the others. Horatio stood there beside him with his eyes fixed steadily on Toro's face.  
  
"Al," he said softly as the reinforcements arrived.  
  
"What is it?"  
  
"My grandfather's knife is over there on that crate they were using as a table." So it was, three-quarters covered by the magazines. Al hadn't seen it. He walked over and picked it up carefully with a handkerchief, not disturbing any fingerprints.  
  
"Sir," he said to Wilson, "would you take this with you and process it? I'll be in after a while."  
  
"Fine," said Wilson. "Do something with the kid." He was still giving uneasy glances to Horatio.  
  
"Come on, let's get out of here," Al said. Horatio followed him out to his car. Once they were at it, but not before, he let his grip on the rifle relax and methodically unloaded it.  
  
Al pulled away from the curb. "How did you get here?"  
  
"I followed you. I wasn't going to get in the way unless I had to."  
  
"Thanks," said Al. "You really did make a difference on this case. It's over now."  
  
It's over now, thought Horatio, looking out the window. It could never be undone, it would never be the same, but it was over now. His shoulders started to shake suddenly, and Al reached across and put a comforting hand on his arm as, finally, Horatio began to cry.  
  
****  
  
Calleigh and Delko stood outside the interrogation room, watching through the one-way glass as Horatio finished questioning Davis' identical twin brother. The man had broken down completely by this point.  
  
"He offered me half, you see. He would set up the alibi in Daytona Beach and make sure he was seen, while I made it look like a mugging."  
  
"And in the dark alley, for a moment, she thought you were her husband, didn't she?" said Horatio. "So she let you come up close." He reached forward suddenly and picked up the man's left wrist, turning the hand over. There was a neat healing cut on the index finger.  
  
"There was a big life insurance policy," said the brother. "He told me his plan was faultless."  
  
"Nobody's plan to commit a crime is faultless," said Horatio. He nodded to the officer standing by, and the cuffs clicked into place.  
  
Horatio exited the room and stopped in front of his two friends. He was so tired he almost had trouble standing up straight, but the eyes were clear. "Good work, everybody. I'm going to take the rest of the afternoon off and go home and get some sleep. Last night was a long night."  
  
"We got him, though," said Delko. "I'll tell Speed." He left, and Calleigh and Horatio faced each other.  
  
"Are you okay?" she said.  
  
"Fine, just tired," he replied, and she knew that he was telling the truth. "I really am going home to sleep. Why don't you take the rest of the day off, yourself? You've had a rough week, too."  
  
His consideration for her at that point was absolutely melting. She glanced around, then hugged him fiercely. "I think I will. Do you want me to drive you home?"  
  
"No, I'm fine. Get some sleep yourself, Calleigh. And I'll see you tomorrow."  
  
"Tomorrow is Saturday," she said, hoping but just making sure he realized that.  
  
"I know." He smiled at her, and they walked out to the garage together.  
  
****  
  
Calleigh stood in the cemetery, looking at the row of tombstones. Howard Caine. Rosalind Caine. Raymond Caine. She knelt and carefully placed a bouquet of roses on Rosalind's grave. "I just wanted you to know that he's not alone anymore," she said. She stood up and smiled to herself, thinking of tomorrow and all the other tomorrows to come. "And you're right. He's worth it. I wouldn't change anything for him, either." She stood there for a moment more, then turned and left, heading home. This week was finally over. 


	7. Epilogue

This is an epilogue to Fearful Symmetry. Hope you all enjoy! If you haven't read that one, all six chapters, you really need to first to understand this one.  
  
Pairing: Guess.  
  
Rating: PG  
  
Disclaimer: Not my characters, but if I ever find a guy like Horatio, I'll snap him up in a heartbeat. Do you suppose they're really out there? However, since I can't have him, I'm glad I can assist Calleigh in getting him.  
  
***  
  
And the night shall be filled with music, And the cares that infest the day, Shall fold their tents, like the Arabs, And as silently steal away.  
  
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, "The Day Is Done"  
  
***  
  
Calleigh knocked on Horatio's door tentatively, not loudly enough to wake him up if he was still asleep. It was Saturday afternoon, but she knew the toll this last week had taken on him, and it would take him a while to catch up. Still, he had said he would see her today.  
  
The door opened, and she was lost again in his eyes. Compassionate, intelligent, humorous, generous - she could look into them forever, taking inventory and never completing it.  
  
"Are you going to come in, or do you just want to stand there?" He gave her his quirky smile. She gathered her wits and the sack of takeout she had with her and entered.  
  
"Good morning," she said, although it was 2:30 in the afternoon. "Did you sleep well?" She set the sack on the table.  
  
"Like a rock. It was delightful." He looked a thousand percent better than he had yesterday. Still a bit worn, perhaps, a little thinner than he had before this week, but the eyes were clear, the shadow behind them finally gone, and his whole aura was once again perfectly calm, self- assured. "I didn't even get up until an hour or so ago."  
  
"I brought lunch, or brunch, or breakfast, or whatever you want to call it." She sorted out the food from the sack, then smiled privately to herself as he held her chair before sitting down in his own. Such a gentleman, Horatio. It wasn't even a front, or a play for attention, like she had seen many times in Louisiana. There wasn't an insincere bone in his body, about that or anything else.  
  
He pitched in, surprised to find how hungry he was. It was always like that during the aftermath, a reaction to hardly eating at all for days. Calleigh finished her share and simply sat watching him. A week ago, she thought, last Saturday, I had no idea what he was doing. It seemed an eternity ago. So much about him she hadn't known. Her mind had taunted her on the drive over today, telling her that his new openness would not last past the end of the storm, that he had only needed her yesterday, not today.  
  
He looked up to find her studying him and grinned at her, not at all taken aback. "Quite a lot has happened in a week, hasn't it?"  
  
"Horatio, I think you can read minds sometimes." She pushed back from the table. "What do you want to do with the rest of today?"  
  
"I want it to be your turn."  
  
"My turn?"  
  
"I want to know who you are, where you came from, who has marked your life. You know all about me now, so it's your turn."  
  
"Somehow I doubt I know all about you yet," Calleigh stalled. She was never good at talking about herself, but after what he had been forced to admit to her this week, she realized that she didn't have any defense to give him. He stood up and came around the table to her, giving her a hug. He knew it would be difficult for her. She hugged him back, marveling at the openness in him now, challenging herself to match it. Still, part of herself was waiting for some cosmic clock to strike twelve and this dream to shatter, like all her others had.  
  
They sat on the couch but at opposite ends, facing each other. There was no emotional distance between them, but they each wanted to fully see the other, knowing that it would help. Calleigh took a deep breath. "I'll start with my father. You remember that time I got a call at work and asked you if I could leave for a bit?" He nodded. Of course he remembered. "My dad's an alcoholic. I had to go pick him up from a bar." She leaned against the sympathy she could feel from him, drawing strength to go on. "As long as I can remember, he would go off on binges. And he would always apologize later. He's sweet, really, when he's sober, but he never means it when he says he'll quit. He always looked at me like he wanted me to believe him, though. After he would get drunk, after he would beat us, he would always come in later to apologize for everything, like that just fixed it." She stopped for a minute, then diverted. "What was your father like?"  
  
He knew that she wasn't dodging the issue, just taking time that she needed, so he answered. "He was kind. Mom was strength; he was pure compassion. He never could stand to see anyone hurt, and he would try to put himself in everyone else's shoes. He had no enemies. I never once heard him raise his voice or say anything against anybody." He paused for a second himself. "Right after a car ran us off the road that night, while he was dying, the last thing he ever said was, 'I wonder what those people were hurrying to?' And he really did, Calleigh. He wasn't upset at them; he was concerned that something was wrong in their world that led to them being careless. He died thinking of other people instead of himself."  
  
Calleigh suddenly wanted to touch him, but she did not want to lose sight of his face. She kicked her shoes off, pulled her legs up onto the couch, and pressed her feet against Horatio's leg. He reached out and put his hand over them, and they sat there for a minute sharing the silence.  
  
"My mother," she said after a bit, "would believe my dad. Every time, time after time, he would apologize to her, and she would say it was all fine. But she started drinking herself to get away from reality. She would drink at home all the time, and he would drink at nights and come home in a rage." Horatio gave her foot a squeeze. "My brothers left home before I did. I spent as little time there as I could. I learned to shoot instead, spent hours out in the woods with guns." She looked at him to see if he understood, and he nodded.  
  
"Something you could control, something that wouldn't change."  
  
"Right. Then when I was a senior, I met the neatest person at school. He was intelligent, compassionate, a wonderful listener." In fact, she thought, he was a lot like you, only you're more so. "The only thing is, he was black. I never knew how prejudiced Daddy was until that night I said he was my date to the prom. It's the only time Daddy ever beat me when he was sober. He ordered me to cancel the date."  
  
"But you didn't." It wasn't a question. She could see the certainty, and the pride, in his eyes.  
  
"No, I didn't. I went to the prom, but I didn't come home. I stayed with a girlfriend for the last two weeks of school, and then I went to the city and got with the PD. I sent cards and letters back, and Mama answered them telling me how he really had changed, how it was going to be different from now on. He didn't talk to me for years. Then he came to visit Miami, and it was all the same, except he doesn't hit me now. Nothing else has changed." She let out a deep breath. "So now you know all about me."  
  
His eyes met hers. "You're incredible, you know it?"  
  
"Funny, I was just thinking the same thing about you." She suddenly remembered how hard he had fought for last week's victim, in spite of his own turmoil, and especially how he had walked straight to her that first morning and looked her directly in the face. Such incredible bravery, facing a seeming nightmare come to life squarely, and no one had been there to applaud him, because no one even knew. She slid down the couch now, getting close to him. "Horatio, I'd like to ask you a question. I was thinking about this, and I'm not just being nosy, but you don't have to answer it." She stopped, waiting for permission.  
  
"Ask away," he said, but his eyes had become a little wary.  
  
"Can you remember what your mother looked like?" He looked across to the piano with her picture on top.  
  
"No," he said after a minute. "Except for one second, night before last, when I remembered the last thing she said to me. Most of the time, I just remember her dead." He shuddered slightly, and she slipped her arm around him.  
  
"I want you to describe her to me." She couldn't see his face totally now, but she felt the question mark shoot off of him. "I think it might help, if you talked about her like she was. It might help you see her again." He was silent. "You don't have to; it was just an idea."  
  
He started slowly, his voice even more soft than usual. "She loved music. She would play the piano for hours. I remember Ray and I watching her play 'Flight of the Bumblebee,' and her fingers would almost blur." He grinned at the memory, and for a second, he could see her playing it. "You know, you might be right, Calleigh. I haven't really talked about who she was. Maybe I can see her that way."  
  
"I went out to her grave yesterday afternoon, after you had gone home. I put roses on it. Did she like flowers?"  
  
"She loved them, and roses were her favorite. She said she admired them most because they were like life. The thorns with the beauty, both together."  
  
"Her name was beautiful. Rosalind."  
  
"She was named out of As You Like It. Her mother was addicted to reading and passed it on. Mom read as much as she played the piano, and she named both of us after writers. She always wanted life to be like fiction. Until that last morning, when she told me it was better than fiction." His voice drifted off into silence, and Calleigh shifted around, like she had two nights before, and began working the tension out of his shoulders.  
  
"You don't have to go on," she said. "A bit at a time might be better. But I want you to see her again. I still can't believe you went through this for 28 years alone." She continued massaging his shoulders.  
  
"All right," he said softly. "I'll try to let you in. But the door swings both ways, Calleigh. Do you go around telling people about your father, or do you try to just deal with it yourself?"  
  
"I guess we've both got a lot to learn."  
  
"I guess we have." She could feel the tension draining out of him, but she could also feel that he still was tired. One day wasn't much recovery from the last five. She pulled his head over onto her lap, again like two nights ago, and stroked his hair gently, smoothing his forehead with her hand, tracing the lines of his face.  
  
"One thing I've been wondering for the last few days, Horatio."  
  
"Just one? What's that?" His voice was distant, dreamy.  
  
"Can you play that piano?"  
  
He grinned. "Not like she could, but yes. Sometime I'll play for you. But I don't think I have the energy right now."  
  
"No, not right now. There will be other days. You still need to rest this weekend." She ran her hands gently over his closed eyes, massaging around the edges, and he let out a sigh and relaxed completely against her. She just sat there holding him, still stroking his hair, long after he was asleep again. She knew that there would be no dreams haunting him tonight, but she did not want to let him go. And tomorrow, and the next day, she would keep working on him, until he was freed from the vision of his dead mother and could actually see her again. "There will be other days," she repeated softly, promising him as he slept in her arms.  
  
Tomorrow . . . 


End file.
